


Only For Tonight

by Mianck



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Comfort, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Happy, M/M, Nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-12
Updated: 2017-09-12
Packaged: 2018-12-26 20:29:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12066432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mianck/pseuds/Mianck
Summary: A strange creaking wakes Mickey up in the middle of the night.





	Only For Tonight

**Author's Note:**

> Hey! I've never written fiction before (my writing skills are limited to essays through school), but this domestic fluff would not leave my head, so I had to write it down. Go easy on me please!

As Mickey slowly surfaced from the deep recesses of a dream involving a certain redhead and whipped cream, two things were immediately obvious: one, the bedroom door was emitting a creaking sound as it slowly swung open and two, whoever was disturbing his sleep and therefore this dream was in deep, deep shit. 

Mickey quietly sat up in bed, making a conscious effort to be as quiet as possible. He shoved the sheets off his legs and swung them over the edge of the bed, his hand already reaching out for the baseball bat that sat behind their nightstand. As he inched his hand closer to the bat, the stream of light from the doorway was steadily growing wider and wider. His heart rate accelerated and his muscles tensed, ready to spring at whoever waited beyond the door. 

He had just wrapped his fingers around the handle of the bat when a quiet, trembling voice cut across the room, “Papa…?” 

Mickey let out a sigh of relief and instantly released the bat from his fingers before reaching up and flicking on their bedside light, bathing the room in a soft, yellow glow. Yevgeny was standing in the doorway, one of his hands reaching up to rub at his eye. Mickey was up and off the bed in seconds, crossing the room to kneel in front of the little boy.

“Bad dream, huh?” he muttered quietly, although Yev only nodded in reply. 

Behind him, Ian sat up with a gasp and Mickey rolled his eyes. If it had been an intruder that was entering their bedroom, Mickey probably would have been dead on the floor by now with their 55 inch plasma screen TV gone and the window open. If nothing else, you could always count on Ian to sleep through just about anything. Mickey glanced back to see Ian peering at them blearily, his hair disheveled and sticking up in a million different directions. Somehow, he still managed to look like he had just strolled out of a cover shoot of Vogue.

“Everything alright?” Ian mumbled. Mickey snorted before answering, “yeah, Yev just had a bad dream, go back to your beauty sleep, Cinderella.” Ian shrugged and immediately flopped back down, pulling the sheets over his head immediately to block out the extra light. 

Mickey turned back to Yev and asked, “You wanna go downstairs and get some warm milk before heading back to bed?”. The kid answered with a nod and reached a hand towards Mickey, who took it and stood up, turning towards the bedroom door. Behind them, their dog, Tank, was heaving himself to his feet after realizing his favorite person was about to make an exit from the room. 

Micky made his way down the stairs, a 5-year-old’s hand tight around his last two fingers and an old, rickety Labrador close on his heels, tail swaying slightly. When Ian’s coworker had posted flyers about rehoming the 9-year-old lab and Ian had brought said flyers home, Mickey had put his foot down. They didn’t have the money, nor the time for a dog. Understandably, the next night, Ian had walked in the front door with the dog, spouting off bullshit about how good it was for Yev and how it would teach him responsibility and give the boy unconditional love. In the 5 months that they had owned Tank, Mickey thought that the only things the dog had taught Yev was that flatulence was nothing to be embarrassed about and food was not to be wasted, even if it had been dropped straight into the mud and now had 8 ants crawling on it. Still, he couldn’t deny that on the rare nights when Yev was at Svetlana’s and Ian was working the night shift as an EMT, he appreciated the calm presence of the dog, his foot resting on the dog’s slowing rising and falling ribcage as he watched TV. It didn’t hurt that the dog had formed an obvious preference for Mickey and would not only follow him everywhere but also acted like the sun shone out of his ass. Hey, if Mickey had to deal with oblivious creatures that were wholly dependent on him for their happiness, they might as well be a quiet, loyal dog and a handsome redhead.

Mickey was so deep in thought that he hadn’t realized that they had finally reached the kitchen until Yevgeny tugged gently on his hand. He shook his head and immediately got to work. Bustling around the kitchen, he grabbed a pot from under the counter and the milk from the fridge. He flicked on the oven and started warming the milk before turning around and hauling himself up to sit on the counter. He glanced over at his son, who had taken a seat at the kitchen table with Tank sprawled out on the linoleum by his feet.

“So, what was your dream about, kiddo?” Mickey finally asked, filling the silence. 

Yevgeny looked at him hesitantly before answering, “People were hurting you and daddy because you guys kiss sometimes. Stephanie at school told me that at another school, someone’s dad was gay and he was a victim of a hate crime and got hurt really bad. What is a hate crime even?”

Mickey’s forehead crinkled as he thought about how to answer this question. He reached over and stirred the milk slowly before finally answering, “It’s when people do bad things to other people because they don’t agree with how they live their lives. There’s nothing wrong with being gay. There’s nothing wrong with being straight. What’s wrong is when people mess with other people’s lives because they don’t agree with their life choices.” 

The milk had started bubbling, so Mickey hopped off the counter and poured it into Yevgeny’s Mickey Mouse mug (Ian had bought both of them Mickey Mouse mugs for Christmas and while Yevgeny had been thrilled, the mug had earned Ian several death glares from Mickey.). He slid the mug over to Yev and sat down in the chair across from him. 

Yevgeny was working his lower lip with his teeth and looking down at the dog. Mickey waited patiently, knowing that pushing the kid would get him nowhere. Finally, the kid muttered, “Have you ever had a hate crime happen to you?”

Mickey sighed, rubbing at one of his eyebrows as he answered, “Yeah bud, but being who you are is more important than making someone else happy. You should never feel scared or threatened to be who you want to be. Your dad taught me that. If anyone else tells you otherwise, you let me know and I’ll take care of it.” 

“Okay, Papa.” Yev said, finally pulling his mug towards him and taking a sip. 

“So, what are you thinking?” Mickey asked, “You want Tank to sleep with you tonight, or you want me to read to you or sweep the monsters out from underneath your bed before you head back to sleep?”   
Yevgeny suddenly looked terrified, his eyes widening and filling with tears. 

Surprised, Mickey immediately hooked a foot around the leg of Yev’s chair, pulling him closer and ruffling his fingers through the kid’s hair. 

Yev sniffled slightly before asking quietly, “Can I sleep with you and Daddy tonight? I don’t want you to have a hate crime happen to you while I sleep.” 

“Ahhh Yev,” Mickey groaned, “You know we told you that once you got your racecar bed, you needed to do your best to be brave and sleep in it through the night.” When they had first transitioned Yev from his crib to a normal twin bed, he would somehow wind up in their bed at some point through the night every night. Mickey didn’t mind in theory, but Mickey didn’t want to encourage the behavior as Yev got older and the kid has also walked in on some things that would have probably had a normal adult wanting to bleach their eyeballs. The latter incidents had left Mickey shaking his head in the background while Ian awkwardly tried to explain why “hugging papa made him sound like he was in pain”. To try and nip the issue in the bud quickly, they had offered to buy Yev the racecar bed they had seen on Craiglist, if he promised to try his best to remain in the bed for the entire night. It had been going well up until this point. 

As a single tear escaped and rolled down Yev’s cheek, Mickey caved, “Alright, but only for tonight and then ya gotta get back to sleeping the entire night in your OWN bed, deal? Head upstairs while I wash this mug and I’ll be right up.”

“Alright!” Yev seemed instantly lighter, pushing his milk away and bounding away from the table. Mickey rolled his eyes and stood up, quickly scrubbing the mug and depositing it in the drying rack beside the sink. Clicking his fingers to get Tank up, Mickey headed back up the stairs, flicking the kitchen light off as he left. 

By the time he had taken a piss and made his back to the bedroom, Yev was already pressed up against Ian, deeply asleep and snoring quietly. His right hand was curled up against Ian’s back, twisted in the material of his t-shirt and the thumb of his other hand was dangerously close to his open lips. Mickey grinned to himself before climbing back onto his side of the bed and pulling the covers around him, effectively trapping Yev in between them. As he drifted off to sleep, he felt a warm, wet nose pressing against his hand.

“Ah, what the hell? Come on up, we’re already breaking all the rules tonight.” Mickey whispered, patting the bed as he spoke. Tank jumped up and settled himself in the space under Yev and between Mickey and Ian. 

When Mickey was young, he used to lay in bed and count the beats of his heart, thinking that the slow “lub-dub” had always sounded very lonely, like the march of a single soldier. As he reached over to turn off the lamp, he realized that with three other hearts beating around him, he had never felt less alone in his life. Now if only he could find his way back to that dream with the whipped cream…


End file.
